


If music be the food of love...

by ForxGood



Category: Ghostbusters (2016)
Genre: Drabble, F/F, Idiots in Love, Just something small to kill the time
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-01-10
Updated: 2020-01-10
Packaged: 2021-02-27 06:09:04
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 988
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/22202359
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/ForxGood/pseuds/ForxGood
Summary: Sometimes, Erin and Holtzmann communicate through music.
Relationships: Erin Gilbert/Jillian Holtzmann
Comments: 2
Kudos: 19





	If music be the food of love...

**Author's Note:**

> Just a little drabble until I finish the final 2 parts of the 'Final Chapters, Blank Pages' series. Enjoy. Come talk to me about these gays in the comments or at @ForxGood on Twitter.

It is a truth universally acknowledged that you can say a lot about a person by the music they play. A specific beat, certain lyrics, and even the way they react to the song can reveal more than someone may want. It’s involuntary: the human body and mind are conditioned to react to certain impulses in certain ways, and music has always been the go-to cure-all.

This was something Jillian Holtzmann had learned at a young age. Like many teenagers she found solace in words sung by strangers, or stress relief in the angry drum and guitar solos blasting from the speakers. Having trouble expressing her own feelings, Holtzmann found comfort in songs, using them to express and say what she never could.

This trait followed her well into adulthood, when she had also begun using songs to flirt her way into cute girls’ beds. She found that her acrobatics and well-placed winks could make many a woman weak in the knees, resulting in her mostly frequenting bars that played songs with actual lyrics.

Erin was different. Much like Holtzmann, she too chose to find her comfort in music, but in a different sense. Rather than having it say what she couldn’t, she used it to accentuate how she already felt. She was looking for friendship, a listening ear, or just someone who understood how she felt, and music provided her with just that. It made the lonely moments less lonely, and for her that was enough.

When Holtzmann first met Erin, one of the first things she did was what she generally did when she met someone she liked: she cranked up the music, and performed her way into the woman’s pants (or, skirt, in Erin’s case). It was only natural to her, and Erin would be lying if she said the prospect hadn’t tempted her at the time. But with the physicist still in denial about her sexuality, and with the engineer still not entirely sure if a one night stand was really all she wanted out of Erin, the ending was less than ideal.

Although that may also have been because something caught fire. In any case, that was the excuse both of them had gone with at the time.

From that moment on, music became a regular thing for Holtz and Erin - who had moved to the second floor of the firehouse rather quickly because Holtzmann was seemingly incapable of preventing things from catching fire less than 5 times a day. It was all fairly innocent in the beginning, with Holtz playing her favourite songs to work to, and sometimes using a few of them to draw the other woman’s attention. (Erin can still vividly recall a performance of Hungry Like The Wolf with blowtorches that caused her to feel slightly more than worry about the firehouse burning down). Every once in a while she’d let Erin pick a few songs, arguing it was only fair if the two shared an office.

Once Erin had finally picked up on the many, in hindsight really not-subtle, hints that the blonde engineer liked her as more than a friend, it was also music that brought them together. The physicist had taken a leaf out of Holtzmann’s book, and had put a handful of songs in the playlist with which she could try to woo the engineer. In the end she had only needed one of the 10 songs she had selected to get the blonde to fall into her arms and kiss her senseless.

Their first fight, and most of their later fights, were also resolved through music. Erin would passive-aggressively put a few songs in that reminded Holtzmann she fucked up, and Holtzmann would retort by playing songs she knew Erin hated. When one of them was ready to apologize, the songs would change, with the person who had put them on the playlist working a little more tensely than usual as their desire for forgiveness blasted through the speakers. Much in the same way, said forgiveness would be granted through music, usually by playing the other’s favourite songs.

As time passed, each woman had also come to learn the deeper meanings to certain songs. With the playlist changing daily, it soon became a habit for both of them to express their own emotions through songs. If Holtzmann was particularly pissed off, there would be a disturbing amount of metal playing, which often caused Erin to be extra sweet to the blonde, showering her with affection whenever she could. And if Erin was playing a little too much Taylor Swift, Holtz knew to pick up a large hot chocolate for her girlfriend. Both were known to add extra love songs to the music list on days they were feeling particularly sappy, with Holtz using them to say things she found hard to say in person, and with Erin using them as excuses to kiss her girlfriend more than usual.

Holtzmann had even tried proposing to music, filling an entire day’s worth of playlist with marriage-related songs. It didn’t work as well as she’d hoped, but Erin had eventually picked up on it and said yes, which to Holtz was all that mattered.

It wasn’t always ideal, but it worked for them, and after a while they had learned to have full conversations just by listening, never speaking a word but saying more than they ever could. There was no song, no tune, no melody they couldn’t identify the meaning of. Music was always playing in the lab, and they would often make a game of their musical knowledge when cuddling. They didn’t have one song, or two, or a dozen: they had hundreds. Music was the most important constant in their life together, which was why, when Erin entered the lab one day, it was more than odd to find it quiet.

Apparently there are certain things in life no amount of music can convey.


End file.
